Noise Pollution and Fighting it with Acoustic Foam

Noise pollution (or environmental noise in technicalproblem. Nowadays basically we have people living on
areas and venues) is termed as displeasing ortop of each other, underneath each other and in fact
annoying human or mechanically caused sound that isall over the place and more importantly interfacing with
or can be described as alien to the environment.modern day technologies in ways that hitherto would
I guess to most of us the major source of this pollutionhave thought to have been impossible. As such the
would come from transportation systems, as anyoneuse of the acoustic foam and the noise dampening
who has tried to hire a car from the main AVIS carsystems are essential.
rental depot at Heathrow Airport would testify to.If we take for example the situation in many cities
Based on the perimeter road at Heathrow sometimesnowadays when we have whole plethoras of modern
the noise of landing 747's can make it a little difficultcommunication links such as underground railway
explaining to the attendant what problems you maysystems, over ground railway systems, modern
have had (or not) with the car you are returning.two-way flyovers and in fact transports
However before we all start to assume that noisecommunications and residential accommodation right
pollution is purely something that occurs in major citiesnext to each other. Without adequate noise reduction
let us consider the effect of noise pollution in ruralsystems in place and incorporated within the structure
communities. Now noise from recreational vehicles hasof the residential and work accommodation than pretty
become quite a major issue with the rural communities.quickly life within these new cities would become
Quad Bikes or All Terrain Vehicles (ATV's) havepretty intolerable.
become a serious problem in the countryside. TheyAs we have said before, enter stage left acoustic
have increased massively in popularity and are joiningfoam. Without these new technologies providing the
the more traditional two wheeled bikes as the vehiclenoise insulation, the quality of life in most built up areas
of choice for off road riding.would be appalling.
The bottom line is that we live in a noisy world and byAt this point it becomes pretty obvious to all
that I mean not just the sound of cars and traffic etcconcerned quite what a debt we owe to noise
but the way we live our lives and perhaps morereduction systems and soundproofing in general that
importantly where we are now living and the densityquite often mere words on no longer enough.
of the accommodation we provide ourselves.Having lived in the centre of London and also spent
In the old days when basically all you had to worrytime on the northwest coast of County Donegal in
about was the old cottage in the middle of the field 6Ireland, when it comes to noise pollution I know which
miles away from the nearest neighbour you couldone I prefer.
make as much noise as you wanted and it wasn't a